Grateful

LETJOG E2W – Day 12: Thursday 25 April – WATFORD GAP to HARBURY (19.1 miles)

I would like to start today’s post with a big Thank You to everyone who is supporting me on this crazy LETJOG E2W venture with your kind comments and messages, and also to those who have very generously made contributions to Parkinson’s UK on my JustGiving page. Given my earlier sponsored treks it has seemed to me a bit much to ask for donations again so soon, particularly in these challenging times, so thank you all especially! I had call yesterday from Alice at Parkinson’s UK, whose regional patch I am now traversing, and along with Michelle, my principal contact, the charity have reaffirmed their gratitude and thanks. All funds raised will go towards the medical research into Parkinson’s disease and, specifically, if we reach our £2,500 target, to meeting the cost of a medical researcher for a month – the monies given are all transferred to the charity within a week, so the help is almost immediate. The link to my JustGiving page is on the HOME and BLOG tabs above, but just for convenience, I will include it in my individual Blogs every few days.

Nick’s JustGiving Page in support of PARKINSON’S UK

The other thing that I would mention again is the ‘Movers and Shakers’ podcast group of well-known Parkinson’s sufferers, that I included in my Blog ‘Move It’ on Friday 12 April. Well today Rachel has sent me an update on the group’s campaign to lobby Government for a ‘Parky Charter’ – they have now met with the Health Secretary and one of their members, the broadcaster Rory Cellan-Jones, has today posted an update. For those interested the link is below.

Parky Charter Update

Now for my own update of a great day on the trail.

My path started out today from my overnight refuge at Watford Gap Services, crossing the M1 motorway, and setting off westwards across the fields on the Jurassic Way to Braunston, where I followed the canal towpath for nearly ten miles . . .

. . . as far as Napton, where my path returned to the fields all the way into the town of Southam: after the town, and halfway to my destination of Harbury, HS2 intervened, causing me to leave the footpath for a not-so-pleasant two-mile road walk

Today has been a fantastic walking day. I started out from the perhaps inglorious location of Watford Gap services, although even here I confess to a very comfortable night’s stay. Watford Gap takes its name from the local village, sited just above a narrow corridor between two low hills that has been a thoroughfare for millennia. The Romans drove Watling Street through the low pass on a route that was later to become the A5 Trunk Road, then the Grand Union Canal arrived in the early 19th Century, to be followed mere decades later by a railway that became the West Coast Main Line. Finally, Britain’s first motorway, the M1 was built through the col in the late 1950s. I crossed all of these transport arteries during my first mile of this morning’s walk. The place name ‘Watford Gap’ has also been taken as the notional point where ‘North meets South’, and so, travelling perpendicular to the divide, East to West, I guess I can say that I am currently traversing the border of northern and southern England! Here are my photos showing how the day panned out.

. . . and within a stone’s throw I was on the towpath of the Grand Union Canal (Leicester Branch) that I followed for just for half a mile . . .

. . . then passing under the West Coast Main Line . . ,

. . . and onto the Jurassic Way footpath, westwards again, across the fields

. . . a characterful village of stone and thatch . . .

. . . and then on the Way again and back into the fields

. . . but it relented right on cue, as I approached Braunston village

Braunston is a village steeped in canal history that was once the northern terminal of the subsequently-extended Grand Union Canal, and it is also the point where this important north-south waterway meets with the Oxford Canal. The village’s name is known well to me, and I guess to others from west Hertfordshire who regularly walk the Grand Union Canal on its path through Tring, Berkhamsted and Hemel Hempstead. At every mile of the towpath there is a stone that gives distances from Braunston, and so, for example, my (eastern) end of Berkhamsted (just to the east of the road bridge carrying Bulbeggars Lane for those who know it) has a milestone reading ‘Braunston 62 Miles’. For this reason I have always been curious and keen to visit the village; it did not disappoint.

The path through Braunston’s Jetty Field wildflower meadows . . .

Just as I thought things couldn’t get any better, whilst hunting for some breakfast I was directed to the ‘Floating Café’ . . .

. . . and I was mighty glad that I had earlier resisted the fast food offers at Watford Gap

The point where the Oxford Canal, my route for today, branches off from the Grand Union Canal; there are no locks whatsoever on the section of the Oxford Canal that I followed today, its route simply following the contour of the land

A crossover point – originally used for the horses to change sides, as they heaved the narrowboats

It is just leisure craft that use the water nowadays

. . . and then it was time for me to turn away from the canal, over the fields . . .

. . . and across clay soils drying after the floods of recent weeks . . .

Leaving Southam on some fine grassy paths . . .

. . . was going so well – until I encountered the HS2 works (that were not shown on my OS App)

So instead of fields and woods, I got this – a supposed pavement, and a supposed 30 mph speed limit

Order was restored at Harbury village, my destination for the day

What a marvellous day it’s been! You will have noticed by the number of photos that I rather enjoyed myself on the trail today – it really was one of those serendipitous occasions when (HS2 aside) everything seems to go right, and small matters like mileage, time, worldly worries, and even any aches and pains, get overlooked in the moment. Magnificent scenery, wildlife aplenty, kind people, and yes, even the weather, all played their part.

I love this picture, but I wouldn’t want to take on the renovation works

My heading today ‘Grateful’ is also the title of a 2014 song by British singer-songwriter, actor and TV personality Rita Ora, that was released on the soundtrack album of the film ‘Beyond The Lights’. The song includes the words ‘I’m grateful for the storm, made me appreciate the sun’ which is a good mindset to hold on a long walk such as mine, and for that matter as a metaphor for life in general. So, as you may have gathered by now, ‘grateful’ is my word of the day!

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